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[Greentrees33]

I need some opinions please. My husband sent this message (trying to attach this) to an ex colleague the day she left. I feel that I may be too emotional/biased so wanted opinions please.

What do you think of this message? To me it seems he has feelings for her and that it is reciprocated but nothing has happened. Do you think this is correct or am I over thinking this?

I also feel that if she didn’t already, the recipient knows his feelings as a result of his text?

Or am I just being crazy and this is all very platonic /fine no need to think anything of it? Please be gentle

Thank you very much in advance

It seems pretty harmless to me. Just that she made his working day better. Some people do that and strike you as special, that's all it sounds to me. And her response doesn't suggest anything.

I know posters often reply using their own experiences and may be bitter about what happened to them but I think there's a tendency for people on here to say move on when there's still a chance it could be worked out. If nothing else this site tells us that it's no party out there and at least you know this guy's issues & history.

I just think this sounds platonic. I hope the counselling can help you both. X

Ah. With the additional information re the fact that you were both going through hard times I’d very much forgive him that text and think that it wasn’t a pick up text but a thanks for the support text. I’ve talked tough times through with colleagues and think some of them have been amazing. I’d probably tell them they were beautiful and amazing people if I wasn’t going to see them again.

I don't think repeatedly calling another woman beautiful and amazing is platonic. All I can say is it clearly was not reciprocated, he sounds like an older man really crushing over a younger woman who is trying to laugh it off.

I think you have had good advice from others on here who have been through a similar situation though.

It's worth noting that men are typically trained to look to sexual/romantic partners (i.e., women they are not related to) for emotional support, not to their friends or family members.

It's horrible and confusing for the female partner of such a man, because women are taught completely different rules about how to access support. But I think for a lot of men who are going through serious things, a non-related woman is easier to open up to/feel attachment to. This causes a risk of physical affairs, for sure, but can also be expressed as platonic friendships, sometimes in which there is a (often unrequited) crush involved.

Basically you may have a man in emotional distress, feeling absolutely unable to lean on anyone because he's supposed to be strong etc, spending time with an unrelated woman and over time feeling that he can lean on her at least a little. He may become really attached to that woman.

We can go on about how he should just focus on his relationship or lean on friends or family, yes, those are great points, but also this guy was suicidal, with an abusive partner who was going through a bereavement. He's not going to make great choices. That's the reality of how life happens.

I appreciate that we like black-and-white rules around here, but in reality, it's all shades of grey and even moreso when there is suicidal ideation, abuse, bereavement, and the reality that patriarchy cuts both ways, it limits men's lives and choices as well as women's, just in different ways. Compassion is needed on all sides imo.

It sounds like a very over the top, emotional, cringey goodbye. It sounds like something I might have written in the leavers book of a boy I fancied in year 11 circa 2001. It's that pathetic.

But it does sound like a goodbye nonetheless. And if it was a goodbye then surely nothing happened after? Who knows what happened before. By the sounds of it lots of chat and mutual flirtation but that doesn't necessarily mean an affair

Candyflosscookie, yes, it was /is my loss. I am writing this point from MY perspective. Did you miss the part about me saying I am dealing with this loss, as is he? How dare you make an assumption based on a minuscule comment which is relevant to how I was talking about the situation and assuming I’m dismissing my husbands feelings? I have never made him feel anything other than that losing our son was a loss to both of us however when I am talking in a thread I am talking about MY feelings and MY situation. Please go ahead and beat me down further 3 months after the loss of my son (see I said my son because I am talking about me) while I already feel life is not worth living.

and the reality that patriarchy cuts both ways, it limits men's lives and choices as well as women's

Bit of a detail but

To be fair @Greentrees33 you have drip fed this thread so much that it has been difficult to follow at times .

Op it seems like you haven't been able to forgive this and part of that is that he hasn't apologised or admitted it was inappropriate (I think it is, and i don't agree with the people who say its platonic, it doesn't seem entirely platonic).

How did you get past this when you got back together or did you think.yiu should let it go but can't?

(What I mean by platonic is not that anything happened but just his feelings).

Please speak to the Samaritans if you're feeling close to the edge, OP.

It's no wonder you're stuck on this text, given the circumstances, and what you've experienced. (I'm sorry, I didn't initially appreciate what you were going through when I first responded.) I think it's somewhat understandable on his part and that you will need to let go of it, but I can absolutely understand why you're still stuck on it.

I think you need to keep on with the grief counselling and maybe relationship counselling and just see where you come to.

Op, it sounds like you have both been through a lot, but are in a better place now. It was 2 years ago: let it go. Focus on the current positives.

OTT and you’re DH looks like a desperate twat.
Wouldn’t be happy at all, sounds like she was just humouring him back.

To be fair @Greentrees33 you have drip fed this thread so much that it has been difficult to follow at times.

The dripfeed that this was two yrs ago etc has nothing to do with that poster latching onto ops expression and assuming a great deal from it and going off on one bout her excluding him etc.

*about

He sounds like an absolute sad old idiot.

Miscarriages are shit. I had a few.

When life got stressful, you became emotionally abusive, he became suicidal, you broke up for a while. Now you are raising a text two years ago that did not progress to anywhere near an affair. How did you even know he had sent that text.

You probably don't want to hear this but raising children will be much more stressful than this is now, hard as it might seem to believe. If you two haven't worked out how to strengthen each other in times of stress then maybe you need to stop ttc. It sounds a very unhealthy dynamic.

He always said it was a nothing message. Deleted her number had no intention to Keep in touch ( he had indeed done this before I confronted him)*

If it was nothing, he wouldn’t have needed to delete her. That’s something you do when you don’t want to be tempted to contact someone, or when you don’t want your partner to see how often you’re in contact.

I would also go apeshit at that. I understand that sometimes people at work get close, and that at times of emotional upheaval, it can be easy to find comfort and support from someone outside of your main relationship because they can be more giving when they’re not also grieving.

However, all the gushy mushy stuff is bordering on (if not full on) emotional affair territory.

FWIW my DP got a bit too friendly with someone from work when he was grieving for a close friend. I didn’t find out about it until much later on, when he assured me he’d shut it down and deleted her etc but I never saw any messages between them. Had I read something like these I’d have found it much harder to get past it. Sorry

Given the background you have posted, I wouldn't be too upset. It seems like he met someone who really helped him in dark times and that doesn't need to mean anymore just because they are the opposite sex.

I would take notice in that I think it's obvious nothing more ever took place, just a support and a good friend.

If your spouse is emotionally abusive to the point you become suicidal then you might delete the friend from your phone.

After all, OP must have found it by snooping.

She kept the photos even after they broke up, when broken up she got action elsewhere despite it being a short period, he didn't and then they got back together again and now she's wheeling these stashed photos out again as if he's the one not committed.

I get the feeling there's no "slightly" about her emotional abuse.

@Greentrees33 this thread is so sad for both of you. I’m so sorry for your loss.
You are in the painful world of grief again you poor thing. I read your DHs message and my initial reaction was that he was totally out of order. However when you added that he’d had support from her when he was suicidal I understood a bit better. I think it is a bit gushing but only your DH will ever know how close this person might have come to saving his life.
It seems nothing happened between them and they’re not in touch now. Why have you brought it all up again now? It’s probably because you are raging against the world with the injustice of what has happened to you. Again I’m so sorry and I hope you and your DH can come together and not blow apart. Please try to be kind to each other

I feel more empathy for your DH, than for you I'm afraid. You should appreciate that he came back to you after seeing others. Does he rehash and bring up the people you were seeing when you split, or is it just you that is raking up an understandable and fortuitous connection that turned out to be supportive and innocent at a time when you were being abusive to him? If he is bringing up what you did - I can understand why he would - then it's going to be hard for you to get past it all as a couple. If he is not and it's just you looking into him, then I think he's a lovely chap who deserves better than what you have given him.

A very difficult situation. I am sorry for Yr loss. If it has been yrs ago he'd have either said it or written it in a card but seeing it on text must be difficult.
We cannot stop our DPs having feelings for other women, if you've been married along time the chances are one of you will develop feelings for someone else at some point but it depends what you do with those feelings. I'd be beside myself seeing those texts, so hurt something you really do not need to see. The only way forward is through counselling.
It's all very well having this wonderful colleague but ultimately he doesn't really know her. It takes years to get to know someone.To get to know the good and the not so good. He is committed to you though.
I have had crushes on others whilst married but then realised that they were silly, and it said more about me than about my partner. They aren't really important it's just getting past all of that. The pain you are feeling maybe connected to the loss of Yr son but this text is was a good diversion.

At the time of this text you were having problems and

So sorry for your loss

I can only thing anyone who has the gall to have a go at you about a word they decided to pick on or something is very bored. You didn't come across wrong at all.

'I have loved every moment' You're not wrong about how he felt and that he made it clear. I don't think she said anything to reciprocate it though, as he said 'I hope I meet you in the next life.' This implies he knows she has no intention of meeting him again.